Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Check out this video and listen to what he's saying about aliasing (fast forward thru his demo of the tuning fork on the piano to :30):

Aliasing is the reason the tines of the tuning fork appear to be moving back and forth (fluctuating) when filmed at high speed. They're not really - he explains that the reason they LOOK like they are is because the video is filming at almost twice the speed of the vibration of the tines, therefore the Nysquist Frequency is in effect.

So what you're seeing is not really happening. (Well, the fork is vibrating, but the tines are not moving back and forth altho they certainly appear to be.) It is a false frequency. Your brain is being fooled into believing there is additional movement that is not actually taking place. Interesting that we are so easily misled by our eyes, yes? Also compelling that they use the term "aliasing" to describe this phenomenon. Google defines alias as: "as known or named at another time or place."

What other false frequencies are we subject to? What other time or place might we be living in?

If our brain is so gullible, why do we trust our eyes (or other senses) to define our world? I read an interesting tidbit the other day about how our brains have more activity when seeing something new than when receiving expected visual input.

"Predictable sights trigger less brain activity than unfamiliar stimuli, bolstering the view that the brain is not merely reactive, but generates predictions based on the recent past. 'The brain expects to see things and really just wants to confirm it now and again,' says Lars Muckli..." (NewScientist.com)

A thought to add to that is it is generally accepted by the scientific community that our body regenerates itself every seven years (some cells are closer to 15, but still not nearly the same as your chronological age). If that's true, why do we retain long-term illnesses for decades? For that matter, why do we HEAL? What makes things change or stay the same?

If our brains are unconsciously predicting the future for us, and therefore we are always re-creating our present situation without thought, it's no wonder the more things change, the more they stay the same. Perhaps we are the alias - the false frequency that isn't really happening. Who's to say the rate at which our eyes perceive is the same frequency at which our brain processes the information?

"Reality is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." ~ Albert Einstein